Big return for Alex Palou in Toronto

Alex Palou strengthened his IndyCar leadership this Sunday after returning to the Toronto street circuit which allowed him to go from 18th to 4th place due to accidents and mistakes by his rivals. The race was won by Colton Herta, his first victory in more than two years.

The Andretti Global team took the first two places on the podium as, in addition to Herta’s first place, Kyle Kirkwood finished second. Third place went to Scott Dixon (Chip Ganassi). Dixon’s third-place finish was the 141st by a New Zealand driver in IndyCar, a record that ties him with Michael Andretti.

The historic Michael Andretti, head of the Andretti Global team, He admitted as soon as he finished the race that it had been a “great day” for his team and that they desperately need success.

For his part, Herta expressed his satisfaction after two years and 41 races without occupying the first place in the box.

“Is incredible. It’s disheartening when you beat the competition and then nothing for a long time. Two years without a victory is very difficult,” declared the driver after his victory.

Although the win went to Herta and Andretti Global, Palou and his team’s Chip Ganassi enjoyed fourth place like gold.

After Toronto, Palou had 411 IndyCar championship points, 49 points ahead of Will Power, who made an unforced error with nine laps remaining when running fourth and finished 12th.

Reduces rivals

The Spaniard started the race 18th on the grid after being penalized by the stewards on Saturday for impeding Pato O’Ward during qualifying. Palou, who on Saturday was optimistic about a possible comeback by pointing out that his number 10 was very fast in Toronto, took advantage of every opportunity in the race.

On lap 51, of 85 in Toronto, after his final tire change, Palou was in 15th place, just behind O’Ward. Three laps later, Palou moved up to tenth position after Josef Newgarden made a mistake in his pit stop.

And in the final round of tire changes, on lap 57, Palou was in seventh place, one behind O’Ward.

From that moment on, the race became a massacre. With 18 laps remaining, rookie Kyffin Simpson crashed into the barriers and brought out the safety car.

Another bad day from O’Ward

Immediately after the restart, on lap 72, a serious accident occurred, triggered by O’Ward’s spin at the dangerous corner number 1 in Toronto.

Palou avoided the Mexican, who ended up pointing his nose towards the middle of the track at one of its narrow points. But others are not so lucky. Up to three cars hit O’Ward’s number 5 in quick succession.

One of the worst was the number 14 of Santino Ferrucci, who after riding over the nose of O’Ward’s car, flew sideways into the barriers and was left upside down in the middle of the track. Despite the spectacular nature of the accident, which left five vehicles out of action, no driver was injured.

At the end of the race, O’Ward complained that drivers were not warned for seconds of his accident, which made it possible for others to crash into his car.

But the drama did not end there.

After resuming the race on lap 76, with nine to go, in a surprising move, Scott McLaughlin was pushed into the barriers by his teammate Will Power as they were running in fourth and fifth place, respectively.

The crash disabled McLaughlin’s car and Power was penalized with a drive-through which promoted Palou to fourth place which he maintained until the end of the race.